


Starguys - Episode One:  The Casting Wars

by Sylvia Knight (Gayle)



Category: Wiseguy
Genre: Zine: No Holds Barred
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1994-05-01
Updated: 1994-05-01
Packaged: 2018-02-19 14:19:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2391491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gayle/pseuds/Sylvia%20Knight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>(WITH APOLOGIES TO MELODY, WHO NEVER MEANT TO INSPIRE IT)</p><p>Originally published in the zine No Holds Barred #5</p>
    </blockquote>





	Starguys - Episode One:  The Casting Wars

**Author's Note:**

> (WITH APOLOGIES TO MELODY, WHO NEVER MEANT TO INSPIRE IT)
> 
> Originally published in the zine No Holds Barred #5

Vinnie stumbled across the sand. He hadn't a clue where he was, but he was pretty sure he didn't want to be here.  One minute he was prowling the back alleys of Brooklyn, looking for strays, the next he was in the middle of fucking nowhere.  There was a really impressive sound track playing when he arrived, but that had faded long ago.  It seemed like he'd been walking forever, and there was nothing but sand and sky.

Then, in the distance, he saw something.  A pillar of fire?  That was promising.  He headed toward it.  But, as he approached, he saw it actually a vast marble pedestal, standing by itself in the sand, with a lone figure sitting crosslegged atop it.  The man appeared to be engaged in vehement conversation with the empty heavens.

"Does there have to be a loony in every arc?" Vinnie muttered under his breath.  Then the figure flung his arms up in exasperation.  Vinnie would recognize that gesture anywhere.  With vast relief, he hurried forward.  Frank would explain everything.  He caught the familiar glint of those little round glasses in the sun.  But what was Frank doing in his bathrobe?

Frank hadn't seen him yet, but the hot desert wind carried his voice to Vinnie's ears.  "I keep telling you, sport, I ain't no Yoda.  And if you think I am, this universe is in deep shit."  He looked down at his lap, pawing through  something that looked like a script.  That was reassuring, Vinnie liked to improvise, take off in unknown directions, but at least a script would give him a starting point.

"Frank!"  Vinnie finally reached the base of the pedestal.  "Yo, Frank!."

"Vinnie!  I was waiting for you to show up."

"What the hell is going on Frank?

"We're on assignment to an AU, Vince.  I've tried to get us out of it, but the powers that be aren't listening.  In fact, they think it's cute."  Frank gave one of those shuddering sneers that made his upper lip quiver.

"Ah . . . Frank, what's an AU?"

"Alternate Universe, Vince," Frank explained with exaggerated patience.

"Yeah, well," Vinnie mumbled, "AU is voodoo as far as I'm concerned, Frank."

"Well you better get concerned.  This is a highly unstable universe we're in.  The powers that be have got their own war going on about who else gets sent here, and who as.  So far, we're the only ones who are established.  So . . . just call me McYoda, the all-wise and all-knowing."

"You're a smart guy, Frank, but ain't that pushing it a bit?"

Frank shrugged and rolled his eyes.  "Go figure," he said.  "I sure as hell didn't ask for this job.  You got a new name too, check out the monogram."

Vinnie looked down at his chest.  He was wearing something that looked like a karate outfit and there was red lettering embroidered across it.  He twisted it around for a better look.  "Vince Sandstumbler," he read.  His lower lip extended in a pout.  "I don't like it, Frank.  It ain't got no poetry."

Frank thumbed through the pages.  "Terranova, Sandstumbler, Skystumbler . . . .  You've got a chance at Skywalker," he said, "but you've got to earn it."

"How?"

"Complete the mission successfully.  We're here to save the universe."

"All right!" Vinnie said.  This was his kind of assignment.  Good old fashioned Good versus Evil, your basic black and white world view.  Maybe even cowboy hats.  He was just wishing Uncle Mike were here to share in the adventure, when a when a wheelchair came whizzing over the sand, propelled by a plump, shiny bullet-shaped robot bedecked with little flashing lights.  A guitar was slung across the back of the chair.  Braking to a halt, the robot burbled happily in greeting.  "Uncle!  You too!" Vinnie cried, giving him a hug.  How could they fail to save the universe now?  But there was one problem that really bugged him.  "Ah, Frank?"

"Yeah?"

"They took my gun.  You know I hate blowing people away, but I feel kinda naked without it.  All I've got is this weird handle whoozis."  Vinnie pulled out the strange gizmo and shook it.  Nothing.  "Kinda flimsy for a billy club."

"It's a lightsword, Vince."

"I don't know from swords, Frank, but don't they usually got a blade?"

"It's a LIGHTsword, Vince," Frank said again.  "Its power comes from The Force."

"Well, Frank, you're my superior in the force, so why don't you show me how to use it."

McYoda wasn't about to admit he didn't know how to get off the goddamned pedestal.  "Vinnie, I got dumped into this role so quick, all I know are the catch words.  But they've promised you a personal trainer."

There was a shimmer and a pop, and a figure appeared before them, robed and carrying one of the handles like it was Truly Significant.

"Roger!" Vinnie enthused.

"Roger?" Frank boggled, and Uncle U2 beebled fretfullly.

"I have a new incarnation, and a new name," Roger announced portentously.  He checked his monogram.  "Obi Wan . . . Buckwheat?  No fucking way!"

Frank looked heavenward.  "There is justice," he breathed.

"Anyone calls me Buckwheat, I take their head off."

 Frank regarded him disapprovingly.  "No offense, Roger, but I think we've got a casting problem here.  I'm the spiritual coordinator for this mission, and in my humble opinion you're a teensy bit trigger happy for this part, not to mention fanatical."

Obi Wan Buckwheat's lightsword sprang to life, glowing on the desert air.  He performed a kata of lethal grace, leaping and spinning on the sand, whirling the weapon in gleaming patterns of power.  Vince was impressed.  "Hey!  I wanna learn to do that!"

Frank sighed.  He almost never said no to Vince.  Not that it did any good when he did.

"Face it, McYoda, I'm the best you've got, and you know it," Buckwheat proclaimed, his eyes aglow with a zealous light.  "I've been to the Dark Side and back again.  Who better to teach a naive innocent like Sandstumbler how to overcome pusillanimous potentates, and take out the forces of evil with a quick flick of the wrist."  He snapped his light sword on and off again.

"He's right, Frank," Vinnie pleaded.  "Roger may a little psychotic, but he's a real honest-to-gosh hero."

Roger wavered and then reformed.

"Make up your goddamned minds!" Frank bellowed at the creators.

"What happened?" Vinnie asked worriedly.  Highly unstable himself, he liked the world to stay put around him.

"Another writer wants to rescript me as your best buddy and ace pilot.  I could go for it," Roger affirmed.  His hands emblazoned the air with invisible letters.  "Han Job for Hire."

"Does Han Job know how to use the handle?" Vince asked, and Roger  shook his head no.  "I really gotta master this handle trick, Rog--er--Obi Wan.  You be my trainer, and let someone else be the pilot.  And anyhow, I pick my own friends," he added, sticking out his tongue at the invisible powers.

There was another shimmering in the desert air.  They all turned to watch.  Vince made out tight black leather pants, a laced vest over a white silk pirate shirt, a pair of intense black eyes, a lewd grin.  "Sonny!" he cried out.  "You're alive!"  Suddenly, the strange handle pulsed in his grip.  A four foot shaft of white light thrust out from it.

"No way!" Frank yelled at the sky.  "No way!"

"Sonny!" Vince screamed as the figure shimmered and vanished.  He flung himself after it, but embraced only sand.  Shaken, he sat up and lifted the sword that had blazed so brightly.  The light had dwindled to a pathetic six inches, and dangled limp and forlorn from the edge of the handle.

"That's a misuse of the force, Vinnie," Frank chastised.

"Hey, whatever works," Obi Wan Buckwheat said.  "Make war, not love, is my motto, but I don't think that's going to motivate our sweet little Sandstumbler, do you, McYoda?

"Frank," Vinnie grated, in his gimme-it-or-else voice.  "I want Sonny back."

"Steelgrave is a snake, Vince.  He's a villain.  He belongs to the Dark Side.  He's got no place on my team!"

"Get him back, Frank, or the next time one of those holes in ozone opens up, I'm diving in after him."

Frank knew that he meant it.  Vinnie had a big heart, and big _cajones_ , but his brain was running a slow third.  Actually, as far as functioning organs went,  even his liver was in better shape.  Vince would leap, and if he leaped, Frank would have to follow, and who knew what AU they'd end up in.  Twin Peaks wasn't all that far from Lychboro.  Frank shuddered.  At least Steelgrave was a known quantity.  "All right, I'll try, Vinnie," he said.  "But they're squabbling up there again.  Trying to recast him."

"As who?"

A new incarnation of Sonny rippled on the air.  Vince thought the love slave outfit was cute, but the hairdo definitely had to go.

"Your sister," Frank said.

"No way."

Sonny shimmered into a dark void.  The figure that now emerged was completely hidden beneath a formidable black helmet and long cape.  It gave out an palpable aura of menace, tinged with a kinda whacky charm.

"Your  father," Frank said.  "At least this time they're sticking to type."

"No way," Vinnie repeated.

With a glitzy flash of light and a satisfying pop, Sonny reappeared on the sand in his original costume.  "Sonny," Vinnie breathed with vast relief.  "You look real good in leather."

"I feel real good in leather too." A silver earring glittered in his ear as he gave a little gesture of invitation with his chin. "Why dontcha come gimme a squeeze hello, kid."

Just then, there was a loud thump and a major dust cloud as a spaceship materialized behind Han Sonny, The Steely Falcon scripted on its hull.

"One week," Frank muttered.  "One week before this sleaze is running contraband to the Dark Side."

"I'll keep him on the straight and narrow, Frank," Vinnie promised.

Frank rolled his eyes.  There was only one straight and narrow path Han Sonny would be traveling, and with only one portion of his anatomy.

"Hey, McYoda, gimme a chance here.  New world, new rules.  You're counter-culture yourself now, man.  Whatchoo say we join forces and pull a fast one on the military industrial complex?" Han Sonny offered generously.  He flexed his shoulders and tugged his leather vest, gearing up for action.  "I tell you, this part fits me like a glove.  I can be a good guy--provided I got room to expand my entrepreneurial skills.  I don't have to own the universe to be happy.  A fast ship, a little tight male bonding," he gave Vinnie a suggestive wink.  "Maybe some nookie on the side."

"All you get on the side," Frank sniggered with malicious delight.  "Is a Wookie."

There was another shimmer, a champagne cork pop.  A small figure appeared, unidentifiable at first except as a sagging suit of yellow fur and a huge, disheveled mass of bleached blonde hair.  A puff of breath lifted the long golden stands back from her face.

"Amber!" Vince exclaimed.  "That wig looks terrible!"

"It sure as hell wasn't my idea.  I'd happily kill whoever stuck this overgrown rat's nest on me."  She yanked it off, unzipped the front of her furry costume and stepped naked onto the sand.  There was a collective male moan.  "I volunteered to be the nookie," she said.  "Soon as I heard Vinnie was here."

"The wookie.  THE WOOKIE!" Frank cried, flinging up his hands.

"Find your own Wookie," Sonny suggested.  "There must be another one somewhere."  Pursing his lips, he eyed Vinnie and Amber with lascivious interest.  "You two know each other, huh?"

"Vinnie and I have this primal thing," Amber breathed.

Vince looked from one to the other, dazzled by a surfeit of riches.

"Oooooo," Sonny gave one of those sharp little whimpers that always made Vinnie's cock jerk.  Sonny smiled at him like he could feel it twitch.  Then he sidled up to Amber.  "I like primal.  I'm also up for polymorphously perverse."

Dragging her gaze away from Vinnie, Amber eyed Han Sonny with new interest.  After all, they had told her she was HIS nookie.  "Manic serial monogamy is my usual mode.  But, I have this secret fantasy," she confided.  "I've always wanted to be the warm, gooey glue in a really hard, tight male bonding."

"Mmmmuummph." Sonny's hips shifted in a carnal cha-cha, and he adjusted the growing bulge in his crotch with an sweetly obscene caress.  "Whaddaya say, Vinnie?  You ready for an experiment in fantasy fulfillment?"

Before Vince could finish gulping, there was a massive shimmer and ear-shattering pop.  The black form was back, helmeted, caped, vaster than ever.  It spoke.  "Vincenzo," it said, the reproach in its voice amplified tenfold.  "Vincenzo, be a good boy!"

With a wail of terror, Vinnie flung himself onto the sand, covering his head with his hands.

"Muddervader," Frank cursed under his breath.  He appealed to the powers.  "Look, we gotta at least have a chance to win this war.  You make Carlotta the dread Darth Mudder, Sandstumbler won't have a prayer."

The form shimmered darkly and disappeared, to be replaced by ten small helmets hoping up and down on the sand.  "The toes knows," they squealed in unison.  "The toes knows."

Shrieking, Obi Wan Buckwheat raced forward, swinging his lightsword wildly.  Giggling insanely, the toes evaded him, rushing about and snapping at the other characters' ankles with tiny piranha teeth.  Luckily, before mass hysteria set in, they too vanished.

"Reincorporated and recast," Frank breathed with relief.  "Mel's now a single entity, Jabberwocky the Hulk.  But just in case, Buckwheat, I want you to fill all our pockets with those shiny ball bearings."

"You think I didn't think of that, McYoda?" Roger shrilled.  "You think maybe I'm losing my touch?  You think I'm shirking? Wrong!  Wrong!  In this universe we have no pockets!  And I told you," he brandished the lightsword at the pillar, "don't call me Buckwheat!"

"Okay, okay," Frank said placatingly,  glad to see Roger couldn't levitate either.  "But, obviously, we all need to be on the lookout for personal demons."

Perhaps it was an invocation, or maybe it was just that the Profitts were psychically inseparable, because now Susan appeared, hovering in the air before them, glimmering in and out of focus.  She was beautiful enough, Vince noted, that she could get away with a hairdo like snails crawling over her ears.  But her eyes had that dreamy glaze that sent chills up his spine.

Amber bristled, but Sonny was already entranced.  "Wow!"

"Succubus!" Frank cried in warning.  "Succubus!"

"Yeah, right, I love oral sex," Sonny slavered.  "Just lemme at her."  But Susan had her sights set on Sandstumbler.

"I am your sister, Vince," she whispered, sliding her silk nightgown off her shoulders incestuously.  "Princess Sue."

"No way," he said.  All Susan could arouse in him was guilt.  Actually, with a Catholic, that meant she was half way home.  Susan was still incredibly dangerous.

"Whaddaya mean no?" Sonny was tugging on his arm.  "Vinnie, Vinnie, she's perfect for the part."

Sensing the weak link, Susan now turned her vacuous gaze on Han Sonny.  The nightgown slithered to her hips.  "Let me give you sons," she murmured enticingly.

"Right on," Sonny said.  Vinnie had to grab him before he started across the sand.

"No, Sonny," Vince said.  "No no no no no!"

"But she looks like your sister, Vinnie, thick dark hair, smoky blue eyes, killer lashes, long legs, gorgeous nipples . . . .

"Just the sight of you makes me pregnant," she moaned.

"Baby . . . . " Sonny struggled in Vince's grasp.

"Trust me on this, Sonny," Vince pleaded.

"TRUST you!  Trust YOU!" Sonny exclaimed.  Then meeting Vinnie's ever-sincere, smoky blue eyes, he shrugged helplessly.  Once a sucker, always a sucker.  "Well, yeah, what the hell.  It's' a new universe, right?  No use dragging around out of date Sicilian baggage.  Kids would probably just cramp my style."

Vinnie watched Princess Sue vanish with a sigh of relief.

"I'm enough woman for any two men," Amber huffed.

"I can believe that," Sonny purred, trying to pick up where they left off.

Amber glared at him.  But he flashed her one of those "I know I'm a schmuck, but you love me anyway grins," did a little rhumba, and gave her ass a friendly bump with his cock.  Amber always did love a man with rhythm.  Play primal for Vinnie and he was right on the beat, but an intricately tangled tango with Han Sonny had definite appeal.  Playfully, she bumped back.  Sonny met Vinnie's yearning gaze, his eyebrows pointedly suggesting they retire in the direction of The Steely Falcon.

Vince groaned as the air wavered, blocking their path to paradise.  Everyone waited with baited breath, wondering who would manifest next.  A plump figure appeared, segments of gold plating straining over a Brooks Brothers suit.  He sniffled, then whined condescendingly, "Sid Threepio reporting . . . yes?"

"NO!!!!" the assembly cried in unison.  The horrifying apparition vanished.

"Sorry, Uncle U2," Frank said.  "Looks like you work alone.  But I think it's better than the alternative."

Uncle chortled his agreement, then rolled his wheelchair to the top of a sand dune.  Beeping a melodic accompaniment, he strummed his guitar, watching the sun sink in glorious Technicolor.  McYoda observed that Obi Wan Buckwheat was practicing his kata again, spinning and jumping and whacking invisible enemies with his light sword.  Nor could Frank fail to note that Vinnie, Amber, and Sonny had never made it inside The Steely Falcon before cementing their bond.  Elbows on knees, fists under chin, he watched them writhe for a while, feeling first disgruntled, then bemused, then . . . .

"Ooooooo," Frank whimpered suddenly, peering closer.  Maybe he shouldn't bitch about Steelgrave being around.  Clearly, he could pick up a few pointers--though just when he'd have a chance to use them was problematic.

The trio had just switched from Amber in the middle to Vinnie in the middle when Darth Mudder reappeared, looming above them.  She shrieked, "Vincenzo!" a few times, but luckily Vince had his eyes closed and was screaming loud enough to drown her out.   She flapped her cape in frustration, and steam came out from under her helmet, but eventually she gave up and vanished.  A few minutes later, when Sonny wiggled his ass into the center of the action, Vinnie was still bellowing happily.  The boy certainly had stamina.

Frank emitted a long-suffering sigh, by now he was feeling both horny and forlorn.  He had a vague memory that, as originally conceived by his creator, this AU was supposed to be F/V.  But, patently, the writers who had taken it over were Sonny fen.  Frank didn't begrudge it exactly, considering that Steelgrave got fried in his universe.  But even if Frank hadn't been written with slashy feelings, it was pretty obvious he'd been cut a raw deal here.  And he'd always thought that Vinnie had beautiful blue eyes . . . .

Beside him on the pillar, the atmosphere began to undulate.  Frank prayed it wasn't Sid again.  The way McYoda's luck was running, Royce would probably mutate into Frank's own, personal Muddervader--his nemesis, the dread Darth Prim.  But it wasn't Sid, in any incarnation.  The air shimmered with a gentle silver light, and the slender form that stepped from out it wore a white gown and . . . .

 "I know," Lilla sighed.  "The hairdo sucks.  But it's worth it to be with you again, Frank.  Han Sonny and Sandstumbler are both into the Wookie," she glanced over the side of the pillar, literally.  Amber is definitely enough woman for two men.  So I pulled rank and grabbed the part of the Princess.  I think you're going to need another level head around, given the crew you have for this mission."

"Is that the only reason?" he asked plaintively.  Plaintive was one of his strong suits.

"You know I'm dying to make love to you, Frank."

"Well, praise the powers that be, nowhere in the script does it say that McYoda has to be celibate."  Downy pillows kindly materialized beneath them.  Taking off his glasses, Frank pulled this beautiful, warm, sensible, savvy woman down onto their voluptuous softness.  Night swooped over them, gently blanketing their bodies with fragrant breezes and starry spangles.  It had been a long time, and Frank made up for every second of it.  You bet your sport shoes.

"Ooooooo," Lilla whimpered after a while.  "Where did you learn that?"

Frank didn't say, he just smiled and did it again.  And again, sinking with delicious slowness into the sweetly obliterating realm of the senses.  This was turning out to be a wonderful world, he realized.  Things could be far, far worse.  Who knew, Frank mused muzzily, remembering the maniacal zigzags of light he'd glimpsed flashing on the horizon, in some other AU, at this exact moment in time, he might even be being forced to eat Buckwheat.

Gratefully, Frank gathered Lilla into his arms.  Together they plunged into the dazzling whirl of the great cosmic blender, where for a blissful, eternal moment they were buzzed into an atomic banana smoothie before being poured forth, whole once more, atop their penthouse pillar.  Returned from that heavenly space/time continuum, Frank felt content, perhaps even . . . happy.   It was amazing what a little ecstasy could do for you state of mind.  Even more important, McYoda no longer felt miscast.  With the Princess' help, he'd finally renewed his contact with the Light, and remembered how to levitate.  The Force was with him now.  Tomorrow he could get them both down from the pedestal.  Then he'd kick some butt and get this mission flying.

After all they still had a universe to save.


End file.
